The Lives They Lived
by Utenakun
Summary: Mirelle was not the first one contacted. OC, MP.
1. A Sound to Shatter All Pasts

**Title:** The Lives They Lived  
**Author:** Utenakun  
**Series:** Noir, pre-series  
**Summary:** When she woke, she had no choice but to call herself Yumura Kirika-- and try, somehow, to make sense of the teasing clues left to her. She couldn't have done it alone.  
**Rating:** PG-13 for violence, lots of it.  
**Disclaimer:** Don't own Noir, and in fact, this is my first stab at a Noir fanfic. At the time of writing, none of the internet domains mentioned in the story existed. If they do now, it's just a coincidence.  
**Notes:** If you're looking for the Corsican princess-- only the slightest passing reference to her, sorry. This is set a little before the series, so it's not too spoiler intense, though Soldats do put in an appearance like the top-notch menacing organization they are. Also, I assume-- as I do with the anime-- that all communication is in French.

---

She opened her eyes to a blank, silent room.

First she yawned softly, then stretched out one arm and rubbed her hand tiredly over her eyes. Had she been dreaming? She couldn't remember now…

Suddenly she froze, and stared with an uncertain frown at the blanket spread over her. She didn't recognize it. She didn't recognize the bed beneath her, or anything in this starched, impersonal room.

With a frightened gasp, she threw off the covers and gazed around her. The dresser-- the window-- the shade of paint on the walls-- nothing. The picture frame placed ostentatiously on a bedside table held only unrecognizable faces.

She rose, her breathing quick and light as bright sunlight made the room blur around her. She winced, walked with unsteady steps to a schoolgirl's uniform hanging from the rack, and rooted around in the pockets until she withdrew a school ID, and her eyes darted nervously for the mirror nearby.

With a shaky sigh, she sank to her knees. The solemn red eyes staring out at her, under a cover of ragged black hair-- those were hers, no doubt about it. But the name written there was 'Yumura Kirika.'

"That's not my name." Her name was… was…

She finally let out a cry of panic, her head snapping up and her eyes darting around the empty room. Her name… she'd forgotten her name! The more frantically she dredged, the harder it became to remember _anything_ at all-- "My dinner," she whispered in agony, "last night, I had-- I ate, I _had_ to have-- My-- my last birthday. I got-- I got--" tears began to bead in the corners of her eyes, "My parents--"

Nothing. Only a single recollection remained of all her life until that morning, only one word whose meaning was gone with everything else: _Noir_.

Still frozen, staring out at nothing, she whispered, "If I have nothing else… I must be… Noir…"

-

Finally, gingerly, she got to her feet and reached for the uniform. She staggered as she tried on the skirt, and had to lean against the wall for support. Her fingers shook terribly as she tried to fasten buttons and zippers, and the bow ended up miserably lopsided. Everything fit perfectly, and felt absolutely foreign.

She closed the door to the bedroom softly and glanced around the hallway. There were a couple simple watercolors on the walls-- flowers and the like-- but here, too, there was an air of absolute vacancy. If anyone was coming to explain what had happened to her, she didn't think he or she was here now or had been in quite some time.

Padding down the hallway, she peered into the rooms as they passed. A bathroom, a linen closet, a laundry room-- nothing, no one. Then, she stopped as the passage opened up into a large living room. Like the rest of the house, it was bathed in light from windows, light that somehow pinpointed how truly empty it was. There were clean, neat mats that looked as though they had never been used, desk drawers that would doubtless be empty, and pictures…

She froze in agony on the threshold, eyes riveted to a family picture. An unfamiliar man on one side, a strange woman on the other, both laughing happily… and herself in the middle. Happy. She forced her eyes down quickly, and did not look at the picture again.

Then, as she stepped in the room, she thought she heard a faint hum. Frowning, she drew closer to the desk and opened a drawer.

The sight inside made her gasp. Bullets, cartridges… a gun. And suddenly, she knew-- she could shoot it. She could turn, now, and hit the middle of the knob on the front door, twenty or thirty feet away. And then she could put another bullet through the hole.

She was shaking again, and her body refused to stop.

Her eyes darted to the blank computer, and she realized that this was where the hum was coming from. It was on, with only the screen shut off. She reached out a finger, but missed and stabbed the plastic right above the button; on the second try she got it.

The screen flickered to life; the computer was already connected to the Internet. And there was a window open, a mail client, she noted as she knelt down. fillemysterieuse(at)anon.fr, open to the drafted emails page. Fille mystérieuse? "Mysterious girl," she muttered, and the startling realization that she could speak French barely even registered. She was more preoccupied with the two emails already drafted, and read them one at a time.

To: "Eunice Tavillion" ETavi(at)mailgratis.fr  
From: "Yumura Kirika" fillemysterieuse(at)anon.fr  
Subject: Help me discover the lost  
Attch: kirkia.jpg  
Attch: map.jpg  
Attch: Melodie.mp3

I wander in search of my lost self, and I believe you search for one lost as well.

To: "Mirelle Bouquet" lesfleurs(at)anon.fr  
From: "Yumura Kirika" fillemysterieuse(at)anon.fr  
Subject: Journey with me  
Attch: kirika.jpg  
Attch: map.jpg  
Attch: Melodie.mp3

Make a pilgrimage for the Past, with me.

She sat back on her heels with a small, concentrated frown. Who had done this-- written these strange letters, obviously intending her to send them, and written them in the name that was, at this moment, hers? The realization finally dawned on her that all this-- the house, the letters, everything-- _must_ have been set up by someone. Someone had taken her memory.

She took a frightened, shaky breath and drew herself up, laying a hand on the drawer handle. "I need to," she whispered to herself, "I _do_ need to. I have no idea… what I'm facing, what has been done to me…" And she opened the drawer again.

The gun was still there, glinting dully in morning light. She set her teeth and reached down, feeling the heft, shuddering inwardly at the fact that finally, something felt normal. This gun was so familiar, it could have been a part of her.

She let out an involuntary gasp as her eyes darted in the drawer again. There, in the back, sat an antique silver pocket watch, intricately engraved with the figures of two sword-bearing women. And this, too, she recognized. She could hear, as clearly as if she'd opened it, the melody it would play.

Her mouth thinned as she took a deep breath, then she pulled out the watch as well. Here in this drawer were the only recognizable pieces of her life, and they spoke not to Yumura Kirika but to Noir. There was no doubt in her mind who she truly was.

-

She decided not to send the emails. She didn't even know what they meant, after all. And perhaps they would bring help, as they seemed to be requesting-- or perhaps they would bring her enemies right to her. As it stood, it seemed possible she did indeed have enemies.

Instead, she went to the bathroom and brushed her hair, straightening her clothes and fixing her bow. She walked into the kitchen, found it stocked with nonperishables, and made herself a tolerable breakfast from that. Her book bag was already packed with textbooks, paper, and a map of the town with her school marked clearly in red ink. So, she decided to go to school.

-

She walked along the road, focused on the route she had memorized so as to keep her head from spinning overwhelmingly at everything that had just happened. Turn right here… three blocks down this road… left past the bamboo grove…

A deafening shot screamed past her ear.

She turned abruptly, muscles bunched in the sudden, furious drive that propelled her off the road and kept her balanced as she slid quickly down a steep slope. Even as her conscious mind screamed in panic-- _Shots_! There were people _firing_ at her!-- it was boxed away in some insignificant corner, instinct flipping her to her feet and making her run hard when she reached the bottom of the hill. Her hand yanked out the gun as she ducked and weaved under a barrage of bullets, then something inside her whispered: _Three of them, and you are only one. Trap them._ Too many bullets for two, not enough for four. Three of them.

The three suited men stumbled down a good deal less gracefully than their quarry, and spread out in a triangle in the clearing at the bottom. Backs to one another, they pointed out at the silent bamboo forest.

"Did she run away?" One muttered.

"No. If she ran, she couldn't stay silent with all this undergrowth. She's here, hiding somewhere. Keep your guard up." It was the last thing he ever said. His companions turned in alarm at the sound of the shot that had killed him, and were promptly felled as well.

She stood, shaking off the dirt of the narrow trough she'd been hiding in, not five feet away from them. Peering down at their dead bodies, she felt nothing but a chill resignation: it was worse than she'd feared; she had enemies that wanted her dead. The ones who had placed her in the house were not the same who had sent these men; those could have killed her any time they wanted. No, in fact, they had saved her, by giving her the gun. So she would accept the aid they had provided for her.

-

Back in front of the computer, she selected one of the messages, read it a final time, and hit send. She sat motionless in front of the computer for several minutes more, then finally whispered words to the empty air-- less than a prayer, perhaps, but far more than a request.

"Please, whoever you are… please help me."


	2. The Farthest Reaches of Memory

Chapter Two: The Farthest Reaches of Memory

"Excuse me?"

Eunice glanced up from her paperwork with a start, her gaze colliding with that of an annoyed woman. "Oh, sorry, I didn't hear you. Yes, miss?"

The woman on the other side of the glass sighed. "It's been fifteen minutes now. How late is the doctor running?"

_You don't mind it so much if it's you she's spending extra time on_, Eunice thought to herself venomously, but plastered on a professional smile and assured her, "Oh, it should be any minute now, miss. She was only ten minutes late before."

Right on cue, Dr. Lodain's assistant, Robert, came out and beckoned the impatient woman in. Eunice couldn't possibly suppress a sigh of relief when she was gone-- she was, after all, the last patient of the day.

Hearing this, Robert smiled at her. "It's been a long day, hasn't it? Go on, get going, you've more than done your job."

Eunice stared up at him, startled. "But I've still got paperwork-- and the reception room needs to be straightened up…"

"Do the paperwork tomorrow morning," Robert advised, "and by the time Loretta comes out, the room will be spotless, I promise." He nodded emphatically.

"Oh, Robert, that's kind of you, but--"

"No, I mean it," he insisted, cutting her off with a shake of his head. "Go home, Eunice. You look exhausted, and that's a professional opinion right there."

Sighing, she ducked her head and reached for her purse. "I-- guess you're right. Thank you _so_ much, Robert."

"Not at all," he grinned as she pushed the door open and gave him a parting smile. "Not at all."

-

Robert _had_ been right about how tired she was-- she certainly didn't feel like buying, much less cooking something elaborate. A quick stop at the bakery gave her two small loaves for dinner and breakfast, and there were still things in her fridge to improvise with.

Entering her apartment, she threw her purse onto the coffee table and plopped the bag of bread on the kitchen counter. She cut open one loaf, layering it with sliced tomatoes and thick mozzarella from her refrigerator, then ate the sandwich right there, leaning over the sink to catch the crumbs. Finishing, she sighed gratefully and rooted around for a glass of water. "That's more like it… I've _got_ to stop skipping lunch."

Taking her glass, she walked over to her computer and switched it on, then settled down. "Hm?" Her eyes narrowed as she scrolled through her inbox. "I don't know any Yumura Kirika…" Then she inhaled quickly as she read and re-read the message.

Surely… surely it couldn't have anything to do with-- that. It had been so long ago… and she'd left it all behind without anyone ever coming after her. There had never been an incident, except for the one that had driven her away…

"This can't be…" she faltered in a whisper, her face gone quite pale. But could she afford to take the chance? Hesitantly, she clicked on one of the attachments.

A quiet melody tinkled from her computer's speakers, an innocent-sounding music box tune, or something of the sort. But for Eunice, it was anything but innocent. Her back stiffened and her eyes snapped open wide with remembered horror-- the shot-- the blood on the ground, with no body-- that _melody_, far away and growing fainter still, taunting her as she struggled to reach it--

She exhaled in a shuddery sigh and slumped over as the music file reached its end. As if freed from a spell, she shook off her shivers and stared hard at the attached photograph. _Yumura Kirika… too young to have been involved, but _somehow_, she knows_… "I have no idea who you are," she murmured at last, "but I suppose I must come. If you are the one with answers."

---


	3. Running Blind

Chapter Three: Running Blind 

"H-here," Eunice stammered in heavily accented Japanese, and fished out money to pay for the taxi. The driver nodded and thanked her, opened the door for her, and suddenly she was standing on the sidewalk in front of the house that—possibly—belonged to Yumura Kirika. She was tense from the moment she stepped out of the car, knowing the whole situation might well be a trap. But there were passers-by walking up and down the street, so if she was going to be killed… well, it would probably be inside the house.

And yet, she had come.

Eunice set her teeth and again tried to call on instincts she had left behind her so long ago. Was she listening for every sound, catching ever dangerous movement? No, of course not. Time had dulled her senses, her reaction time. But she still had to take the chance, so she approached and rang the doorbell.

Suddenly, she was staring down the barrel of a gun in the peephole. She fought down her gut reaction of a scream, a jump away from the door—she wouldn't die here. She _couldn't_ die, not yet, damnit!

A stream of muffled Japanese came through the door, and this, more than the gun, panicked Eunice. Oh, _shit_. How was she supposed to…

"I—I'm Eunice Tavillion," she replied in French, since she knew nothing but a phrase or two of Japanese she'd been able to memorize on the plane. "I received an e-mail from Yumura Kirika, and I'd like to speak to her, please." Again, she had to call on all her self-control to keep her voice calm… and to keep from adding, "and for the love of God, don't shoot."

The gun vanished, but there was a long, silent pause on both sides of the door. Eunice was just about convinced that Kirika, or this bodyguard friend of hers perhaps, couldn't understand French at all and was preparing to blow her away. But then the door edged open, just a little, and Eunice found herself staring down into a girl's thin, haunted face. It was hard _not_ to stare, really with the extraordinary color of her eyes, but what held Eunice's gaze was not even her odd red eyes so much as her fear, her vulnerability. If not for the gun dangling loosely and familiarly from her hand, Eunice would have said that this girl needed to be protected.

They stood there for a moment, the girl hiding from the street behind the door and Eunice's body, until Eunice finally said quietly—in French, the Japanese equivalent completely gone from her head—"You're Yumura Kirika?"

The girl nodded, half-opened her mouth and hesitated, then finally murmured in French, "And… are you… Eunice Tavillion?"

"Yes," Eunice said, then made a conscious effort to soften her stare and added gently, "May I come in?"

"Ah! Y-yes, please do," Kirika stuttered, nodding rapidly and stepping back from the door. She muttered something quick and complicated in Japanese, then blushed and stopped in confusion as she realized Eunice couldn't understand it.

But she could, at least partially, and she'd stopped more out of confusion than incomprehension. "Does that mean, 'welcome home?'"

Kirika glanced quickly at Eunice's eyes, at the door behind her, then looked away and nodded before padding silently off down the hallway. Eunice stared after her for a moment, then suddenly remembered another tip from the 'Japanese Culture' section of the guidebook and hastily began to take her shoes off. Welcome home. What an odd girl.

-

Japanese houses were so much cleaner, Eunice mused as she walked down the hallway, heading towards the sound of what she guessed was Kirika preparing tea. The walls were painted an off-white that took the light they received and reflected it, almost, until they seemed to glow. The hardwood floor was spotless, and there was nothing else. Eunice frowned slightly. In some respects, it was a lovely house; in others… it was almost an antiseptic hospital.

She stepped into the large living room and took it in. Kirika was kneeling before a low table, pouring tea into two cups and now glancing up to invite her to sit on the opposite mat. But Eunice paused for a moment, looking around the room. It was strange; there were a couple pictures of family, but nothing really personal, no clutter, no magazines, nothing. They were apparently a very neat family.

Which brought her to the first point she intended to address, the one that was possibly even more important than asking why this Japanese girl who spoke flawless French had dragged her halfway across the world. "Ah, I don't mean to be rude, but—your parents, do they know I'm visiting? Is anyone home at the moment?"

She'd said the wrong thing, evidently. Kirika stared at her unblinking for a long, startled moment before turning her head abruptly away and stammering, "N-no… no. I… I live here… alone. My parents… moved to America."

"_What_?" Spluttered Eunice. It was the most ridiculous thing she'd ever heard of! Her parents had _moved_ and simply left her here? What, had they forgotten her in all the business of packing?

And just like that, she knew. It was improbable, flimsy, a barely credible excuse. Of course; she'd been stupid, really, not to guess it before. And with her realization—_they're still at it_—a sudden wave of fury rose up in her, forcing her words almost to a whisper. "My god—they did it to you, too, didn't they?"

Kirika lifted her head, two faint creases wrinkling her forehead. "'Too?'"

-

_How frightening is it, to have nothing in the world except a single piece of paper with a telephone number and some terse, scrawled instructions? She sat for a long moment, staring at the telephone before lifting the receiver and dialing._

_ Whoever was on the other line picked up amid static and loud background noise. "Sasha Darcan here."_

_ She swallowed dryly and read verbatim from the paper. "I—I'm calling from 01, 44, 92, 52, 86…" Here, her script ran out, but it hardly mattered—the woman on the other end swore suddenly, so loudly that the sound was distended and unidentifiable, and hung up._

_ She didn't have long to wonder what that had been about, though. Not an hour later, the front door was blown away by a firestorm of bullets, and a tall woman with furious blue eyes and short blonde hair burst in, grabbing her and administering an incredibly painful headlock. "Who the hell are you?" The woman screamed. "What the fuck are you doing here!"_

_ She was too petrified to do more than cling to the woman's muscular forearm, trying vainly to pull it away from her neck, and sob, "I don't know—I don't know—I don't—" Shaking, she offered up the piece of paper._

_ The woman kept her held tightly in one arm while she examined the paper with another. "Christ. Who gave you this? Who told you to call me? _Why_ the fuck did you come here?"_

_ "No one—" she whispered, running out of air. "I—just had it, when I woke up, I swear—I woke up here—I don't know where I am—I…" The room was starting to swim._

_ "Shit." Sasha finally loosened her headlock, though only slightly, and started towards the ruined door. "We'd better go somewhere else before we decide what to do with you."_

-

"You know my name," Eunice began, taking a sip of the really quite excellent tea, "but what else do you know about me?"

Kirika stared at her a moment, then shook her head mutely.

"Do you even know why you were supposed to contact me?"

Another shake of the head.

Eunice tightened her lips grimly. "Well—I'm guessing you know more about that gun than just how to wave it around. But you don't know your own past, or what you're really doing here. Am I right?"

Kirika's head snapped up, her eyes wide. "How did you know?"

Eunice dropped her eyes, glaring bitterly at the polished surface of the table. "Because I woke up once, in a room I didn't remember, with no name or memories, and it wasn't half as pleasant as this."

-

_She tried not to cry as she was thrown to a very cold and hard concrete floor._

_ "So," Sasha began, stepping into the room after her, "let's begin. Who the hell are you?"_

_ "I don't know," the girl mumbled._

_ Sasha was at her side before she could blink, the gun cocked and kissing her temple. "Don't fucking PLAY with me! You've made this a very bad day for me; now tell me who you are!"_

_ "I don't KNOW!" The girl screamed in terror, her restraint broken. "I swear I don't, I just woke up this morning and I don't know where I was, I DON'T KNOW WHO I AM, I don't remember, I swear it, please, please, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I don't know what I did, please don't kill me—" she was sobbing freely now, certain her death was at hand._

_ There was a long, chilling pause, and then she heard Sasha take a deep breath and say in a much quieter tone, "Start from the beginning. You didn't know where you were?"_

_ "N-no, I—" a hysterical hiccup—"I woke up this morning and I didn't know where I was… I don't know my own name. I know it sounds crazy but it's true, I swear! But—but there were clothes in the closet that fit me, and that little paper on the dresser…"_

_ Here, Sasha broke in, reading from the paper, "'Don't go to the hospital. Call the number below and tell the woman who answers that you're calling from this number: 01-44-92-52-86.' Shit. Fucking shits. I see now."_

_ The girl wasn't sure if the fact that Sasha understood meant she would live or die, but at least she hadn't been killed yet. "S-see what?"_

_ She was released and Sasha stood her up, keeping one hand on her shoulder and looking at her seriously—but no longer angrily, she noted to her intense relief. "Someone wanted you to come with me, and they picked just about the best way to make sure I'd take you. That apartment? That was where I lived with my adopted parents until they got shot by a mugger one night a couple years back. You were calling from my old home, see? Whoever it is really knows how to push my buttons." Her hand slipped from the girl's shoulder, and she tilted her head back, staring off into space. "Fuck."_

_ "So… what will you do with me now?"_

_ Sasha shrugged. "I'll take you in. It sounds crazy, but I have a feeling you'll be handy in my line of work."_

_ She could have been lying and readying herself to blow the girl's head off, but at that moment the girl was more than happy to cling to the hope that Sasha was serious. "S-so you mean you b-believe me?"_

_ Sasha nodded, still not looking at her. "I do."_

_ "…W-why?"_

_ Sasha frowned and brought her gaze down to rest on the gun in her hand, which she then shoved back into its holster on her leg. "Let's just say, I have a long, uh, memory for this kind of thing. Come on."_

-

"Yes," Kirika breathed, eyes wide, "that's… almost exactly what happened to me…"

"You see? And that was more than twenty years ago," Eunice mused, "which means… god, it calls into question almost everything we did. _We_ never got close to figuring out who had done this to us, but you—for it to have happened to you, that means something larger is at work. No lone sicko could have the time, the money, all the resources to set this up so perfectly and keep doing it for more than twenty years." Eunice put a hand to her head, overwhelmed. She, Sasha and Kirika were being manipulated, marched perfectly around a vast and unknowable board. And where, exactly, would they be led?

"'We?'"

Eunice's head jerked up to stare at Kirika for a long moment, then she set her jaw grimly. "I don't know about you, Kirika," she began, ignoring the girl's question, "but I'm pretty tired of being trifled with to this degree. You called me for a reason—so that we could work together. Fine, let's work together to pull this whole business down, and figure out who you really are. Will you work with me?"

She watched as astonishment washed over Kirika's face, before the girl's eyes softened and she actually, incredibly enough, smiled. "Yes. Please. I need to know what's been done to me."

"I thought so," Eunice nodded, satisfied. "Now—before we can plan what we'll do first, we need to know what our resources are and what we can do. So, do you have any money?"

Kirika shook her head, "Not… not very much…"

Eunice pursed her lips. "Hm. A problem. I have a bank account, but it's no great wealth. Well—you know what they say, any problem is just a challenge to be faced…" she eyed her companion and thought better of speaking to an amnesiac in such a way. "Well, maybe you don't know, but anyway, that's what they say."

Kirika nodded mutely, and Eunice suppressed the temptation to roll her eyes. She was getting the measure of her companion, and already she could tell that most of Kirika's responses would consist of nodding or shaking her head. Mutely. "It's crap, of course, but we'll go with it for now. Small challenges while we work up to the big one: who you are, and why someone wanted us to meet and work together."

_And what really did happen to Sasha that night._

---


End file.
